[quote=@TemplarKnight07]


[hider=The "Fairy Seeker"]
CS:

Name: Gideon Morgan Armstrong
Alias: Gideon
Race: Human
Court: Not aligned
Position/Occupation: Student, Avid Fantasy reader and gamer, and a seeker of occult/supernatural knowledge
(Actual) Age: 16
Personality: Shy and introverted, Gideon grew up with not having many friends in school and bullied for his "unusual" hobbies for his age, and has ended up lacking in terms of social skills and with few friends outside of a close circle of fellow hobbyists. He likes to over-analyze situations, especially when nervous, falling back on his substantial intellect (for his age) and exceptional memory to recall what others would see as useless or irrelevant information, yet completely forget important dates or events simply because he finds most human social interaction boring. He possesses a curious mind in spite of his social anxieties though, and always loves to learn something new or forgotten by most others.
Appearance: Weighing only at 120 lbs, Gideon is a scrawny but not necessarily weak individual, with muscles that lacked definition and a thin frame. His skin slightly more pale than normal due to prolonged periods inside, and having a full head of slightly messy unbrushed brown hair, but always washed and never below his shoulders in length. He has some freckles on his face and a few scars on his face from previous acne, though unlike many other nerds, he was fortunate enough to have been born with naturally straight teeth and no need for glasses. He normally wears jeans, running shoes, and related t-shirt of one of the various fantasy series he was an avid fan of. In short, he's an almost entirely average teenage nerd.
Family: Christopher and Mary Armstrong (Parents)
Ambition: (Goal) To become a Magician, or at the very least prove for himself that magic and the supernatural were real.
Background: Gideon has grown up feeling not in place with his own world, or at the very least that his world was perhaps the most boring one he could have been born in. Obsessed with fantasy books and stories of all kinds since he was young, his love of fantasy turned into a love of the supernatural as he grew up. A believer in magic, but lacking the ability or even the proper knowledge to even test if he has any ability, he hunted through his local libraries and browsed the web for any accounts of magic or the supernatural, and how exactly magic was believed to have come from. 

Though the majority of the fictitious and scary stories dealt with people making deals with malevolent demons and ultimately losing their souls in exchange for their powers, he did find accounts of slightly more benevolent beings, Faeries, or The Fae or Sidhe as he came to know them as he dug through more "true" accounts. 

Though many of the stories and accounts were fragmented, had crappy translations, or were in some cases just complete bullshit, he did manage to discern several important aspects about the Fae. One, that they were incredibly varied in personality within their seasonal courts (though his knowledge only extended to the Summer and Winter dichotomy, as humans in their simplistic interpretations mostly just lumped Spring with Summer and Fall with Winter) leading to Fae that were potentially both benevolent and malevolent in their own abstract ways. Two, most of them feared iron, especially cold iron as it apparently was more deadly to them than magic, with even small amounts causing them great pain and had been used in the past to ward off Fae Folk (Gideon reflected that this explained why iron probably gained more prevalence in antiquity as a human tool and why the Fae hadn't just conquered their world forcibly). Three, some Fae loved word games and riddles as tests of intellect could be just as serious duels as ones with swords, and that words held great power among the Fae, that promises and wishes had to be abided at the peril of the one making them. And lastly, four, that there were ways for the Fae to enter the human world, and for humans to enter the Fae World, even though most encounters involved child snatchers with both benevolent and malevolent Fae stealing away Children to make them into Changelings or other "monstrosities", there were others of Faeries of different kinds falling in love with humans to various effects, and of ancient sages communicating with the Fae or entering their world to do so through ritual.

Such knowledge was accumulated over a couple years of increasingly interested study in between homework and scheduled events. Eventually Gideon decided that he should try actually looking around for Fae, when what he saw as a major problem dawned on him: he lived in Canada! Almost all of the recorded accounts of Fae he could get his hands on dated back to Europe, where the ancient Celts and Druid cults among others had worshipped the Fae as deities and stones and forests older than most human civilizations resided. Though he didn't see any reason why Fae would be limited to Europe in this modern age or even back then, he still had zero frames of reference to go on in terms of where to look, given that local mythologies were all Native American in origins, attributing misgivings to their own supernatural entities. So, barring a chance encounter with a Fae, Gideon decided he would try to figure out how to perform a ritual to open a way into their world, and so set out to find what he thought was a suitable place, get the right materials and information (or as right as he could find), and setup for the appropriate time.

Gideon eventually got to the point where he stopped telling anyone about his pursuits, as he would usually get one of three reactions: chiding comments about how foolish and childish he was to believe in Faeries and Magic, odd looks based on those same sentiments, or being teased and bullied as a "Faerie-boy" or "Faerie-Seeker". To save himself the bother, he merely kept his secrets and worked to gather materials and knowledge as he could in his spare time. 

Eventually, he reached a point just after his sixteenth birthday where he felt he was ready to try and attempt the ritual. He had learned and memorized some basic Gaelic incantations, managed to scrap together some arcane symbols and designs that replicated the far older arcane geometry of the standing stones, and he had spent several months meticulously setting up an ad hoc ring of standing stones within an old growth forest fairly close to his home and quite secluded. He had spent a huge amount of time ensuring the mathematics and measures were precise, he was smart enough to know how potentially dangerous this ritual was even if everything went right, he was terrified of what would happen if he did it wrong.

For the timing, he settled on May 1st, the day of the ancient celtic holiday of Beltane, which traditionally marked the first days of summer, hoping that the official transition may increase his chances of actually ending up somewhere in the Faerie world that wouldn't eat him right away or freeze him to death. He packed some provisions, a couple water bottles, some fruit and non-perishable snacks, his diary, a compass, plenty of implements to draw or write, and an old pocket watch. Out of caution, he also brought along a pack of iron nails, as nowadays its almost impossible to actually buy an iron sword, let alone be able to have such a weapon as a 16 year old, but knew it would be foolish to not bring something along to protect himself. 
 
At mid-day, leaving his parents on the premise of going on a hike that would take him into lunch and be back before dinner, he performed the ritual he had been preparing for some time, intoning the ancient words thought to have been spoken by sages and druids long-dead, and putting his will and belief behind his actions. For a few moments, nothing happened, until ever so gently as if a curtain were peeling back, a door-way sized portal opened up between the two stones he had marked for just such a purpose. Unwilling to believe even his own eyes, but even more worried that the portal wouldn't stay long, he hurried through, hoping that his preparations had actually had an effect and he was not just going to leap into a monster's maw.
[/hider][/quote]

There's a few things I wanted to ask about. I'm just going to go through it piece by piece, it is the easiest way to keep things straight in my head. Not all of it will be strictly relevant to actually having the character accepted as that is LadyRunic's department but most of it would probably be good to think over just so the details look right.

[quote]Though the majority of the fictitious and scary stories dealt with people making deals with malevolent demons and ultimately losing their souls in exchange for their powers, he did find accounts of slightly more benevolent beings, Faeries, or The Fae or Sidhe as he came to know them as he dug through more "true" accounts.[/quote]

This isn't really so much a grievance as a note about the character but by whatever criteria he discerns accounts to be "true" or not there should by the nature of the fae be just as many accounts of people losing everything to their faerie deal as there are accounts of them getting what they want from good natured fae.

[quote]Though many of the stories and accounts were fragmented, had crappy translations, or were in some cases just complete bullshit, he did manage to discern several important aspects about the Fae. One, that they were incredibly varied in personality within their seasonal courts (though his knowledge only extended to the Summer and Winter dichotomy, as humans in their simplistic interpretations mostly just lumped Spring with Summer and Fall with Winter) leading to Fae that were potentially both benevolent and malevolent in their own abstract ways. Two, most of them feared iron, especially cold iron as it apparently was more deadly to them than magic, with even small amounts causing them great pain and had been used in the past to ward off Fae Folk (Gideon reflected that this explained why iron probably gained more prevalence in antiquity as a human tool and why the Fae hadn't just conquered their world forcibly). Three, some Fae loved word games and riddles as tests of intellect could be just as serious duels as ones with swords, and that words held great power among the Fae, that promises and wishes had to be abided at the peril of the one making them. And lastly, four, that there were ways for the Fae to enter the human world, and for humans to enter the Fae World, even though most encounters involved child snatchers with both benevolent and malevolent Fae stealing away Children to make them into Changelings or other "monstrosities", there were others of Faeries of different kinds falling in love with humans to various effects, and of ancient sages communicating with the Fae or entering their world to do so through ritual.[/quote]

Assuming that whatever information available about the fae rivals that of what is on our own internet the fact that he could get [i]all[/i] of these points exactly right seems rather unlikely. If you couldn't tell by me being here I'm rather a fan of ancient folklore.

Your points essentially boil down to this:
One: Fae reside in two Courts, Winter and Summer, Summer is kind, Winter is vicious.
Two: Fae fear iron.
Three: Words hold special power in the land of Faerie.
Four: Humans and Fae can cross into the other's world.

I'll grant you that these are all very common interpretations but they are far from the [i]only[/i] common themes and a thousand and one variations of these themes exist through folklore, games, novels, legends and so forth. The idea of separate courts ranging from the names to temperament of fae that live there, the effects iron actually has on a fae etc. My point is that Gideon is a high school student. You have yourself said that he does his research between "homework and scheduled events" which means outside of faerie research time he has a life that takes up a good portion of his time and given that he has a life he's not traipsing around various areas looking for fae or interviewing locals about anything so his research basically boils down to the internet. With that as his only source being able to say with confidence "this is true and this is false about the fae" makes him either very arrogant or have incredible tunnel vision regarding his research. You can find sites that say fae live in four courts, in two, some that say the Seelie and Unseelie courts are a figment of human imagination and the fae live together as a single people. Some sources that say iron burns them to the touch, others that they cannot cross an iron barrier such as a fence or even a train track. There's theories regarding salt, leaving gifts for the fae in exchange for favors. Throughout history the fae have gone from deities to sprites to spirits to ghosts to mischief makers to demons to monsters and back again.

My point is that with a nearly limitless supply of information all of which from one source or anything contradicts itself at least a hundred times how can Gideon be so certain about these specific points regarding fae culture and nature?

[quote]Eventually, he reached a point just after his sixteenth birthday where he felt he was ready to try and attempt the ritual. He had learned and memorized some basic Gaelic incantations, managed to scrap together some arcane symbols and designs that replicated the far older arcane geometry of the standing stones, and he had spent several months meticulously setting up an ad hoc ring of standing stones within an old growth forest fairly close to his home and quite secluded. He had spent a huge amount of time ensuring the mathematics and measures were precise, he was smart enough to know how potentially dangerous this ritual was even if everything went right, he was terrified of what would happen if he did it wrong.[/quote]

My above point about this stands as the chances of him pulling the correct ritual out of what must be sixty five billion different recipes from various sources is very coincidental but my real question is this.

Now [@LadyRunic] if you could weight in here cause I'm going into an area of lore that is a bit sketchy but I'll give it by best shot. If I am wrong about this let me know. I believe though that magic performed by mortals who haven't been gifted it by the fae is incredibly unlikely to the point of none existence. Most rituals of ancient times that the pagans used to open gates to the fae world more likely were simply messages to the other side altering a specific fae that they were asking for his or her help and if the fae was in a good mood he would open the portal himself. That or else they cracked open already existing tears between the two realms, just widening them to the point where anyone could walk through rather than one person simply falling through by accident and that particular tear never being found again. It would be the same reason fae gates were built where they were, Stone Henge, Avalon, etc, they simply stabilized and amplified a weakness in the veil between world already present. Otherwise as I have to assume Gideon is not the only fae fanatic in the world everyone would be trying to this and because in your version it seems to take no special skill, specific placement or consent from the other side thousands of humans would be pouring into faerie monthly.